Preparation for our dissolution (3)

Down the drain

Watch. Watch carefully. See. See clearly

The comforting sound of water retreating in circles

I used to say that water turned to milk

I used to think when cream mixed with transparency

Pearls swirled and ebbed like fire flies in dark.

Kept warm beneath tiny radiators stuck on walls like beige moths

Glowing against a 40 watt bulb

Don’t open the window it’s stuck, it’s stuck on being underground

We breathe in soot, we turn ebony in our effort to

Rise.

She couldn’t lift the baby carriage, in those days it weighed

More than she did and the stairs, sticky with linoleum were

Narrow like her little arms attempting to heft us toward

Light.

We mired in dark. We stayed still as stalagmite in caves

Children’s books. Detective novels. Smite the key in the lock

Green plants fitfully reaching. Reaching. Reaching

Your arm is never long enough.

Recall the smell of boar hair brush. Of Clinique blue bottles

Is it magic? How does it glow? Mouthwatering

How they had a misted outside, I ran my finger down and traced outlines

Someone in NYC designed this shape. The shape of places far and lettered.

She had wool, it got wet washing her hair, the edges frayed

It smelt like grandma’s farm with damp goat fur at 5am

Nobody had anything then. We opened our hands to emptiness

Paper lotus. Needle. Oh Lord. Darn a way out.

Everything is so different now. I did not learn how

To cooperate

How to join. How to thrive. What if you are

Born only of coal?

The heavy weight of circular plates laid over paving stones

A funeral of sorts, bury the mother, bury any off-spring

Only blood. Only letters after names. Knights and paupers

The history of war. Victors write. The rest rot beneath daisies.

She grew insufficiently, facing away from sun

Her skin parchment, knees knocked

The pain in her. Oh the pain in her! No words.

She closes her eyes. Turquoise like the stones found in New Mexico

When she was told that, she said; Yes I will buy a ticket

Board the plane, swallow the dream, take the red pill or

The blue.

It was so savage. The quiet. The silence.

When she left there was nothing but the brush and the bottles

Gathering dust, follicles left spinning in air

Are some of those skin cells, still her?

Reconstruct

Is it any wonder she knows best, people of vacillation

And change? She knows the feeling exactly when told one thing

Tomorrow another truth hangs primly in

Your narrow closet.

Her ear lobes are detached, she read once in a woman’s magazine

Attached ear lobes are a sign of beauty

She has larger knee caps than her shins

The skin barely covers her climb

Trees of white, pearl, honey, comb, hair brush, blue

Bottles.

They didn’t fix the streets they remain

On fire

And they ate coal in preparation

For their dissolution

“Il y a dans le coeur humain une génération perpétuelle de passions, en sorte que la ruine de l’une est presque toujours l’établissement d’une autre.” Rochefoucauld.

 

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